How Howard Got His Funk Back
by Demactica
Summary: When Howard's pre-wedding jitters upset Old Gregg, the boys find themselves torn between fame and safety.
1. Prologue

A/N: Greetings and salutations! This will be a co-authored fic, written and edited by myself and Chalcedony Rivers. Just thought I'd mention that today is Julian's and Chalcy's! birthday! Happy reading.

-x-

Rage.

Rage, despair, fury, revenge.

That funky purple udder, his only companion, was gone, and Old Gregg just wasn't the type to be stolen from.

Stolen from by his fiancée, nonetheless! Certainly, Howard was different than Curly Jefferson, the ungrateful, shoe-licking fiddler. Howard _loved_ Gregg, as he could love only Gregg and as Gregg could only love him. And so he should! Gregg knew that he did. For one, he was still wearing the ring the merman had put on his finger (partially due to some superglue), plus Gregg had already selected a wedding dress.

But then, why would he have run?

Pre-wedding jitters. Inexcusable. This, too, would have to be dealt with. Right after Gregg got his Funk back.

Already, a plan was forming: go to Dalston, find Howard and take back what was rightfully his. If he hurried, he may be able to stow away and come back with Howard as well; maybe knock some sense into the fool, find out what in the world he'd been thinking. The fuzzy little man-peach didn't know the first thing about the Funk: didn't know that it needed to be bathed in a tub of warm buttermilk every other Thursday, and that it could be fed only fresh lettuce and curry, and orange juice on special occasions. No one but Gregg knew these things, and Howard should be punished for his arrogance.

Those fishermen back on land, he knew that they all called him evil, and Gregg begged to differ. It wasn't that he was evil.

Just a bit psychopathic…


	2. Chapter 1

Howard sighed and lay back on his bed, listening to Vince moving around in the room next door. He'd drawn the curtains tightly, so that even the distant sound of the Moon singing cheerily about calendars couldn't penetrate through and the room had been plunged into a smoky darkness. The room felt dusty; he could feel the grime clogging up on his lips and drying out the inside of his mouth. Surely they hadn't been away that long. He'd thought it was only a week, but then it had been hard to keep up with time. Through the thin, nutmeg-papered wall, Vince was humming a sparkly tune to himself as he unpacked. Howard envied Vince, sometimes. It was that ability to not let anything get to you. Nothing could make the sparkly little titbox sad, and if it did he had a few remedial ponchos stuffed at the back of his gargantuan wardrobe. Howard often felt sad; in fact he felt pretty sad right now. Maybe sad was the wrong word. He felt guilty. He felt terrible for letting poor Vince down when he'd brought his hopes so high.

The worst thing was, Vince didn't seem to care. On the boat on the way home, he'd merrily chirped away about nonsensical things rather than breach the subject at hand. Howard would have preferred it if Vince had been angry. Somehow, the fact that he was ok with Howard having mucked up their future made it worse. He was so optimistic, and they'd been so close to Lady Fame they could practically smell her perfume. And then they'd been thrown off the boat, and the box had floated away. Guaranteed, the Funk hadn't been the prettiest of salvations, but, as much as he hated to say it, he'd grown oddly fond of it. It was like a strange sort of animal, like a purple cat but without the fur and the body and…well, ok, nothing like a cat, but that wasn't the point. And Vince had loved the…thing, so he hadn't just lost their future, he'd lost their pet as well, and he felt bloody terrible about the whole thing.

"Oi, Howard!" came a voice outside the door. Howard sighed, and slid off the bed towards the door. When he opened it, Naboo was standing there, frowning slightly in the nonchalant way that seemed to be his default expression.

"Oh. Hey, Naboo" Howard said, attempting a smile.

"What you doing up here? I need you two ballbags down in the shop!" the tiny monotonous Shaman lisped. Howard looked at him in confusion.

"What shop?"

"The Nabootique?" Naboo asked, as if Howard was an idiot. Howard rolled his eyes.

"What the hell is that?"

"Well, since you said you were going off to that meeting with Pie Face records I needed a new form of income" Naboo explained, exasperated. "I wasn't going to starve, was I?"

Howard's shoulders sagged. "Alright. Give me five minutes"

Naboo nodded, and shuffled off back down the corridor towards his own room. The handle of the door opposite to Howard's clicked, and Vince emerged, regally as anything. They'd only been back for two or three hours, and yet he had already spent that time cleaning himself up, making himself look as majestic as possible. His black hair was still dripping wet from the shower, he had draped a rich, deep blue velvet dressing-gown around him that drooped around his thin frame, and he was clutching his Nicky Clarke straighteners. He grinned cheekily at his flatmate: "Alright, Howard?"

"Not really. Since when did we have a shop?"

Vince blinked at him. "Since f'rever, you doughnut. We just ain't used it before"

Howard glared. "Let me rephrase that then, Vince. Since when has Naboo decided it would be appropriate to open up said shop and force his tenants to work in it?"

"Since he stopped bothering trying to get money off us?" Vince shrugged, pressing a sizzling strand of black hair between the irons. Howard's shoulder sagged. Why was it Vince was at his cleverest when they bickered?

"Why you so bothered anyway, 'Oward?" Vince continued. "I mean, how hard can it be? He ain't forcing us to _do_ nothing"

Howard scowled at him. Vince hastily backtracked.

"Well, he ain't forcing _me_ to do nothing, anyway. So what's the problem?"

Howard heaved a sigh, and leant against the psychedelic blue-patterned walls. "It's just…it doesn't seem right, you know? We're musical pioneers, Vince! We should be playing Glastonbury! Not shut up in a little second-hand place in Dalston when we could be out there, making it big"

Vince's arms were bent behind his head, his face a mask of intent concentration as he straightened out a kink at the back of his head, but at these words the blue seas in his eyes flickered slightly, so slightly that Howard literally blinked and missed it.

"Thing is, Howard" he said slowly, deliberately, his brain furiously attempting to deliberate between the two motions of speaking and straightening at the same time. "I reckon it might be good to work in the shop for a little while. Just…" he hastily continued at his flatmate's horrified expression, "Until we can pay Naboo back for the rental fee, s'all. Might give us some time to relax, get some in…instipation?"

"Inspiration?"

"Yeah, that's the one!" Vince grinned. "Maybe work on some solo tracks, yeah? Plus, Naboo can't evict us if we're working for 'im, can 'e?"

Howard nodded slowly, wondering when his electro friend had ever found time in between his hair routines to take an interest in their finances. Vince grinned, satisfied with his own powers of persuasion, and retreated back into his room, shuffling feet scuffing the ground in his sleek black slippers.

_Two weeks later…_

Bollo shut the door to the shop, and turned towards the large carpet that was hovering outside. Momentarily, he glanced through the window to see the two shopkeepers talking animatedly, silent as mime artists through the thick glass, probably still bickering about dry ice. Ahead of him, Tony Harrison was squawking at his master to hurry up. Bollo sighed quietly, and rolled his eyes. He could smell the vodka and lime combination already steaming off the littlest Shaman's head-sac.

"Oh, climb aboard, Monkey-Man!" Harrison groaned. "You are wasting valuable drinking time!"

"How many have you had, Harrison?" Bollo said, hoping that the dig would provoke a response out of the ballbag, who he found irritating beyond belief. "You started already?"

"Liquid breakfast" Harrison rebuked, smirking proudly in a way that made the ape want to throw him off the carpet again. "I've had champagne on my Golden Grahams. I am steaming!"

Luckily, Dennis stepped in and muttered something pretentious to pacify Tony Harrison. The carpet started, and Bollo risked another quick glance through the window. Harold was staring into a mirror. Vain idiot.

"You alright, Naboo?" came the thick voice of Saboo. In front of him, Kirk was already slumped forward onto the carpet, staring drug-eyed and open mouthed at Dennis's bald head and giggling like a moron.

"Yeah, yourself?" Naboo replied, not really caring.

"Yeah" Saboo nodded. "Although…" Suddenly his voice lowered to a whisper, one that made it sound like he was entering into some dire conspiracy. "I'm not really supposed to tell you this, but there's been a bit of trouble…Dennis told me not to tell anyone, but he told me because he trusts me-" (Jerk-Off, thought Naboo) "And I thought that after that whole…cock-up with Nanatoo…" he shifted uncomfortably, remembering his pratfall. "I thought I owed you a favour, so I'll give you a tip-off"

Naboo nodded, and Saboo leaned forward towards him, speaking quietly.

"There's some bad juju afoot, Naboo. I mean really, really bad stuff. Thing is, we don't know what it is. Dennis just keeps receiving signals that something's coming"

"Something's coming?" Naboo repeated with a lisp, and frowned. Saboo nodded.

"Exactly. This really might be The Crunch, this time"

"And I suppose you're the one to fix it, are you?" Naboo muttered. Saboo sighed.

"Just…be on your guard, alright? It might be nothing, but still. Just in case"

Naboo nodded, just to shut him up, and then Tony Harrison promptly vomited on the carpet, and the conversation was forgotten.

He snarled when he saw the poster on the lamppost. Snarled so harshly and ferociously that a young Dalston mother grabbed her child's hand and quickly pulled her away from the scary figure. He reached up, his hand shaking with rage, and swiped down the yellowing sheet of paper, already thinning from damp. He held it up to his eyes, drinking in the pictures and the text, before crumpling it in his fist.

One year. It had taken him one whole solid year to get to where he was now. And how had he been thanked? By this…this monstrosity! The realisation that Howard, that _his_ Howard had gone off with some little tart in a feathery cape! It was an absolute outrage; especially how Howard's rejection of his advances had been publicised for everyone to see on top of a roof. He'd left soon after the bouncy castle came out, because well, quite frankly, there was no excuse for this sort of behaviour.

Petty revenge could wait until later, however. First, he needed his Funk back. Having drunk nothing else but Funk-juice for the last couple of years, he was still as funky as ever, but he'd noticed yesterday that his prized tutu was beginning to lose a little bit of spark. Yes, he needed it back as soon as possible. And if he was lucky enough, he may be able to kill two birds with one stone…

He smoothed the poster for Howard's birthday back on the lamppost, took a pink highlighter from his jacket pocket, and began to write.

"I can't believe you would do that to me, you titbox!"

"Do what?" Vince laughed, looking up in surprise from where he was sat on his bed. Howard was almost shaking in anger. After making sure Naboo and Bollo were sound asleep and stoned out of their minds on the sofa, he'd taken the pains to seek out his so-called friend and confront him. He should have known that Vince would play dumb and innocent, as always.

"You know what, Vince. You replaced me!"

Vince shook his head slowly, and the way that even his hair swung patronisingly only served to make Howard angrier.

"You've gone wrong, 'Oward-" But Howard was having none of it.

"No I haven't, and you know it" he growled. Was it his imagination, or did Vince's eyes widen just a little bit? "I bet it was all your idea as well, you electro ponce. What, did Naboo offer you another cat-suit to forget about me? Or did you just not care?"

Vince sighed. "I knew you'd take this the wrong way!" he said, the cockney tones in his razor-sharp voice highlighted. "It was just temporary, yeah? We all knew you'd come back eventually"

He apparently realised too late that this was the wrong thing to say when Howard picked up an empty shoebox from the floor and chucked it at his head. He ducked as the cardboard hit the wall with a dull thump and fell on the bed.

"What are you doing, you freak? You could've have me eye out!"

"Well, that's not the end of the world" Howard replied bitterly. "You would've had eye patches in fashion within five minutes, wouldn't you? And what do you mean you knew I would come back? I chose to, you know"

"No you didn't!" Vince retorted. "I bet you were as much a laughing stock in Denmark as you are over here. We knew you'd come crawling back because, let's face it Howard, you wouldn't get anywhere without us"

"Oh yeah? I got further than you did. At least I did something in those two weeks I was away. You were replaced by a crustacean"

"Whatever" Vince sighed sharply. The younger man was clad in a long peach tunic with a black outline of bird feather on it, something Howard remembered him dragging home from TopShop a few months ago. It went well with the black jeans, less skinny than those of the Black Tubes but still highlighting every bony angle, and with his thin face and straight nose Vince looked remarkably like a bird of prey: flighty yet sinister. "Fact is, Howard, you're hardly one to talk about fame and fortune, are you?"

Howard stopped in his tracks. "What do you mean by that, sir?"

"Well, considering you basically mucked up my future for me, forgive me for mocking your fall from grace" Vince sneered. "If it weren't for you being a tit like always, I wouldn't need the Black Tubes. In fact, I wouldn't even need this shop, and I certainly wouldn't need _you_ anymore, would I? But no, I have to make do with the crap hand, because it's your fault that the Funk is gone, isn't it, and we both know it"

And there it was. Everything that had been building up since they returned to the flat was there in that tiny little sentence. All the tension, all the fights: it hadn't been down to sexual tension, as Howard had incorrectly inferred – it had been down to the gap between them that had remained unmentioned since it had began, and now it was spilling out all over the floor, lapping at their toes.

"Vince, I-"

"Oh, fuck off Howard. I don't need this, yeah? There's a rave at the Velvet Onion, I gotta meet Leroy in ten minutes…" Vince mumbled. He stood up, slightly uneasy on his new knee-high black boots, and pushed past a stunned Howard from his bedroom. Howard heard him slowly creep downstairs. Then he turned, quickly, and called out.

"Vince! Wait a minute!"

"Bye!" came the defiant and sullen reply, and then he heard the ring as the shop door opened and shut.

And then there was a muffled scream.

And then nothing.

Faster than he'd ever moved in his life (which wasn't easy with the extra weight he'd gained recently), Howard charged to the top of the stairs, and ungracefully threw himself down them and out the front door. But there was nothing there, no trace that Vince had even left. Breathing heavily, Howard looked up and down the street, but nothing. Vince couldn't run that fast, not in those new boots. Howard's eyes widened as much as they could, and he cursed under his breath.

There was a rustle, and then the noticed the piece of paper that had been slid under the door and was now caught beneath the doormat. With trembling hands, Howard Moon bent down, picked it up, and began to read.


End file.
